Tokyo’s street furniture is waking up and wants to talk to you

In April 2015, Hello Lamp Post Tokyo, created by London based PAN Studio, was presented at Roppongi Art Night 2015, Tokyo's premier art festival of contemporary art staged in the Roppongi district of central Tokyo. For one night and day, Hello Lamp Post Tokyo woke the street furniture of Tokyo as well as Tokyo Tower and Roppongi Crossing, both iconic Tokyo landmarks. It offered the citizens of Tokyo the delightful experience of talking with the city, and a playful opportunity to rediscover their local environment in a completely new way.

Hello Lamp Post Tokyo is an English/Japanese bilingual version of Hello Lamp Post, the winner of Watershed's first Playable City Award in 2013. Hello Lamp Post invites people to talk to familiar city objects using the messaging function of mobile phones. It is a new city-based communication platform which connects citizens with each other and with the city by starting conversations that share memories of the city through its physical infrastructure.

SPECIAL TALK: FUTURE CITY, FUTURE TOKYO – CITY, ART AND TECHNOLOGY

Watershed’s Creative Director Clare Reddington, and Ben Barker and Sam Hill from PAN Studio travelled to Japan for the festival. They took to the stage with game creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi, for a special talk session facilitated by Seiichi Saito, Creative and Technical Director of Rhizomatiks. They shared their views on how art and technology can come together to influence the relationship people have with each other and with cities in the future, and discussed the potential for playful and creative ideas in shaping a vision for the future of Tokyo.

PLAYABLE CITY WORKSHOP

The festival was an excellent opportunity to introduce Playable City to Japanese creators working with technology at the cross section of art and society. Inviting Seiichi Saito as special guest, Clare Reddington and Sam Hill facilitated a creative workshop to share a taste of the Playable City approach with the gathered participants with diverse creative backgrounds.